'He'd smoke him': Bleak reality facing juiced-up James Magnussen as Aussie great takes fresh swipe

The Enhanced Games "blur the line between morality and entertainment", according to Aussie paralympic legend Ellie Cole.

The first edition of the games, which allows competitors to use performance-enhancing drugs and dangles a US$1m carrot for breaking a world record, will be held in the USA next year.

But a documentary released last week to mark 12 months until the event has thrust the controversial Games into the spotlight.

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Former Aussie Olympian James Magnussen is one of the leading figures in the games, and his participation has been largely condemned by the Australian swimming community.

Speaking on Nine's Wide World of Sports', Cole explained one of her biggest concerns was the unknown health issues that could affect athletes later in life.

"There's no medical science that can tell us what's going to happen 20 or 30 years down the line for athletes that are taking these drugs," she said.

"As an athlete myself and one that has known a lot of athletes, I've seen athletes push their bodies to the limits, clean athletes, year in year out, needing shoulder reconstructions, hip replacements.

"You have athletes that have low body fat percentage, some female athletes miss their period (which) affects their bone density later in life."

In addressing the argument about the unknown health risks, she conceded competing clean at the highest level takes its own heavy toll on athletes' bodies.

She also said the doping effect will also take some of the shine off the direct competition.

"I think people just really need to realign what their expectations are when they're watching these games," she said.

"These games aren't about being the best athlete ... it's not really athlete versus athlete. It's athlete versus world record or athlete versus human body.

"It's not really about being fair – that's the whole point of it."

The $1m bounty came after Magnussen pledged on a podcast last year to take part in the games if such a reward was on offer.

Magnussen has since outlined exactly what substances he's taking and how he's taking them.

But the documentary revealed not only did Magnussen not break the record, he was well over a second slower than his clean personal best.

To rub salt into the wound, Greek Olympian Kristian Gkolomeev – who himself became interested in the Enhanced Games after listening to the Magnussen podcast – went 0.02 under Cesar Cielo's 2009 record to claim the cash for himself.

But Cole said Magnussen's openness about his doping program posed its own set of risks.

"Who knows what kid is going to be reading these articles saying exactly what he's taking, and then ordering in those performance enhancing drugs. We see how jacked he is..." she said of Magnussen.

She also questioned his motivation in coming out of retirement, and also his brashness in targeting a world record.

"James Magnusson has always had a little bit of a reputation. In the lead up to the London 2012 Games, I think we all remember, he said: 'Brace yourself. I can swim at 80 per cent of my max effort and still win the Olympics', and he didn't," she said.

"At the start of this Enhanced Games journey, he said he was going to be taking performance enhancing drugs and breaking a world record within six months.

"He's just raced, and he was 1.2 seconds over his personal best time over 50m.

"So he's putting a lot on the line, a lot of questions unanswered about the health of these drugs, (and) for what? To swim 1.2 seconds slower?

"If he versed Cameron McEvoy tomorrow, Cameron would smoke him."

Magnussen's best time of three attempts was a 22.73 - a whopping 1.82sec slower than the 20.91 he was chasing, and 1.21sec slower than his own clean PB of 21.52.

McEvoy won the men's 50m freestyle gold medal in Paris with a time of 21.06sec.

A question that continues to burn is what happens to athletes who take part in the Enhanced Games, but then return to clean Olympic competition after their program finishes.

"Everyone knows they've been doping, you see James Magnusson putting on 15 kilos of muscle," Cole said.

"He could compete in LA, he could compete in Brisbane, and as long as he's clean in terms of his blood and his drug tests, then he's allowed to."

She added his times at the moment are well outside Australian qualifying standards.